Genshin Impact characters are at the heart of it all. Each month a new character is introduced, each with unique abilities to help you explore the open world of Teivat and take on the challenges of Genshin Impact. They are also very attractive, beautifully drawn and well voiced, and usually have special story quests that delve into their backstories.Genshin Impact is a bit like Pokemon, but instead of collecting cute creatures, you build a crack team of anime heroes! It is. Genshin Impact's characters are also how the game makes its ridiculous amount of money. According to an analysis by market intelligence site Sensor Tower, every time a character is added to the game, players who try to get their hands on them fetch about $12 million (about $1.2 billion) on the first day.

I say "try" because "Genshin Impact" is essentially a gacha game that rewards new characters with limited-time loot boxes. Each month there is a different wish banner, and players can spend primo gems to get a new or old character. The odds are not very high. There is only a 0.6% chance of getting an ultra-rare 5-star character (although there is a system where you can always get one if you try enough times). Primo gems are easy to get just by playing, and loot boxes are very inexpensive. Still, that doesn't stop players from betting real money on these wish banners.

According to mobile analyst Sensor Tower (a website that tracks spending on various mobile games), "Genshin Impact" has already earned over $1 billion in just six months, not including revenue from the PC and console versions. This makes "Phantom Impact" the fastest growing game in history. By way of comparison, the mobile version of Fortnite took two years to reach the $1 billion threshold.

Driving those profits are Genshin Impact's characters. On average, Genshin Impact generates about $5.8 million a day, but each time a new character is added, that revenue jumps to an average of $12 million. And this is only for mobile.

The most popular character added to the game was Zhongli, a Geo Pole Arm wielder who sparked controversy when players noticed that he had been nerfed significantly from the closed beta version, although MiHoYo eventually buffed Zhongli, Sensor Tower estimated that Zhongli earned $15.5 million on the first day it became available. Another popular champion was Xiao, who contributed an estimated $15.1 million in player spend upon its release on February 3.

One reason these two outperformed other roster additions like Albedo and the recently added Fu Tao may be that players have been waiting for their release since Genshin's launch. Both Nakazato and Xiao were part of the closed beta test of Genshin Impact, so players were probably eager to finally play them in the production version. It is curious, however, that there is no trend as to which characters are the most popular. Characteristics such as gender, appearance, and the ranking of characters on the "Phantom Impact" tier list do not seem to influence who players are willing to spend their money on.

While it is fascinating to see how much revenue Genshin Impact characters can generate, it is also not surprising that Genshin Impact is doing so well; MiHoYo has been steadily releasing meaningful updates and events since last year and is making an already great RPG even better. If you haven't tried it yet, here's our review of Genshin Impact.